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He’s gone.
I’ve been sitting on my knees beside him, and I stay there for a long time. So long my feet go to sleep and start to prickle. My shoulders keep hunching, and the lump in my throat keeps growing, and then without warning I buckle, falling forward with sobs that actually hurt as they tear through my throat.
I haven’t been sobbing for very long when I’m faintly conscious of the sound of an engine approaching. Then footsteps behind me.
It’s Grant. I know it is. I try to straighten up and stop crying, but I can’t.
“Shit.” Grant kneels down beside me and lifts up my head and upper body so he can see my face. He gives me a quick scan and then reaches over to feel Noah’s pulse.
He quickly assesses what I already know. Noah is dead.
“I’m sorry.” He’s looking at me again. Still holding me with one hand curved around the nape of my neck. “There was nothing you could do for him.”
“I… know.” I have to choke the words out. I’m still sobbing helplessly, and I don’t like it because I’m not normally like this.
He draws me toward him until I’m burying my face in his shirt and wraps an arm around me tightly.
I haven’t cried like this since my dad died. I’m not sure why I can’t seem to stop now. But it feels better for Grant to hold me like this. His hand is strong and hard at the back of my neck, and his other arm is almost bruising as it’s wrapped around my middle. It’s exactly what I need to feel right now.
After a couple of minutes, the sobs start to fade—from exhaustion more than anything else. I stay pressed against him limply. I don’t want to move, and I’m honestly not sure I’m capable of it.
Grant smells strongly. Like sweat and dirt and the faintly ashy outside air. It’s not a pretty fragrance, but I like it anyway. It feels safe and strong and familiar.
It smells like him.
“Y’okay?” he asks in that gravelly voice that proves he’s feeling something.
“Yeah.” I sigh and make myself straighten up. “I’m okay.”
He finally loosens his arms. His blue eyes search my face. “I’ll bury him as well as I can. Then we’ve got to get somewhere safer than this for the night.”
“Where will we go?”
“New Haven, I guess.” He rubs at his face and the back of his neck. “If there isn’t a bed for us, we can sleep in the barn. At least it will be safe there as we figure out what to do.”
“What did you find out?” I ask, realizing there are important things that completely slipped my mind. “Are our people safe in the bunker?”
“They seem to be. I think most of them got down there. I saw about twenty bodies.”
I squeak at this number.
“Not all of them were our people,” he goes on quickly. “Our guards took a lot of the attackers out. It looked like a Wolf Pack, but it was too big for just one. Maybe a few of them got together because it was so tempting a target. I don’t know. But I’d say we probably lost Noah and about five or six others.”
Part of me wants to ask who he recognized among the bodies, but the rest of me doesn’t want to know. Not right now. Not on top of everything else. Losing Noah is hard enough.
Grant seems to realize this because he goes on, “They’re camped out there. Right above the bunker. But they don’t have the capabilities to get into it, so I think the rest of our people are safe for now. So let’s get to New Haven tonight, and then we’ll figure out what to do from there.”
I nod, licking my dry lips and glancing back toward Noah’s body.
“I’ll do my best to bury him for now,” Grant murmurs. “And when we’re safe, I’ll come back and bury him better.”
“Thank you.” I’m not sure why I say this. Just that he made it sound like he was doing it for me.
* * *
The sun is low by the time we’re able to start back toward New Haven, and it’s completely dark when we get there.
We’re lucky their guards don’t shoot us as we approach, but one of them recognizes us. They make us wait until Jackson comes out from the house and gives permission to let us in.
